


To Heal The Hurt

by InArlathan



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Post-Trespasser
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-02
Updated: 2019-12-02
Packaged: 2021-02-26 01:26:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,643
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21645202
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/InArlathan/pseuds/InArlathan
Summary: After the revelations of "Trespasser", Lavellan finds herself back in her apartment in the Winter Palace. For once, she is alone, unable to fight her conflicted feelings for Solas any longer. That is when Cole shows up, helping her one last time.
Relationships: Female Inquisitor & Solas, Female Lavellan/Solas, Fen'Harel | Solas/Female Lavellan, Lavellan & Solas
Comments: 2
Kudos: 27





	To Heal The Hurt

**Author's Note:**

> More Solavellan today, yeah! I was kind of in a sad mood, so this turned out a bit dark and angsty. I hope you enjoy this. If you like, reach out to me on [Tumblr](https://in-arlathan.tumblr.com).

She will never shoot an arrow again. She knows it with unwavering certainty as she pulls the sash of her uniform over her head with one hand. 

Her one remaining hand.

Her fingers toy with the buttons on her jacket. The fabric rustles, while she struggles to push the buttons out of their holes, but she eventually manages it. Swearing under her breath, she tosses the jacket aside. Luckily, there are no servants nearby to hear her outburst. They would only alarm her companions, and she is not ready for their pity just yet.

Lavellan is back in the apartment she had been assigned to for her stay in Halamshiral. It consists of a set of three rooms large enough to house an entire family, with statues of golden lions and lavish oil paintings of human women in fine Orlaisean silks lining the walls.

Suddenly, being at the heart of the Winter Palace feels like a charade. What is she doing here, after all? She, a simple Dalish elf?

The notion reminds her of her time in Haven, when the Breach was still threatening to tear the world apart. Before she had become the Inquisitor. Before all of this. 

It had taken Lavellan weeks before she had grown accustomed to sleeping in a bed. Back in Haven, she often ventured outside her small wooden cabin to watch the stars as they traveled through the night sky, waiting for exhaustion to claim her. Even in Skyhold, where everything had been made to represent her, from the Dalish curtains to the lush gardens, she had a hard time sleeping with a massive stone roof over her head. It had taken her months to get used to it, and even then, she sometimes dreamed of sleeping out in the woods, listening to the wildlife and the wind around her.

But these chambers––they are just ridiculous. Suddenly, her stomach churns with revulsion. The same revulsion she had felt on her first stay at Halamshiral. 

She flings some more swear words at the lion statues and kicks her jacket farther away. Most of them are elvhen phrases, but she tosses in some curses in the common-tongue for good measure. 

It is a good thing the Inquisition was disbanded. For the first time in two years, she can go wherever she wants, free from the burden that came with the title of Inquisitor. 

Free from the burden of the anchor.

A sob escapes her and she sinks to her knees, her fist clenched, jaws tight.

_“The mark will eventually kill you. Drawing you here gave me the chance to save you, at least for now.”_

Solas’s voice is still loud and clear in her mind as if he stands right in front of her, but she knows he is gone.

_“I walk the Din’anshiral. There is only death on this journey. I would not have you see what I become.”_

But does he know that not being with him felt like dying, even after all this time?

She covers her face with one hand, as the tears begin to cloud her vision. Once more, she had reached out to him. And once more, he had pushed her away. Holding onto him had brought her nothing but pain, again and again. Yet, she holds onto it like it was some precious thing. 

Why was it so hard to let him go?

“Because the pain reminds you of the joy you felt when you were together,” a soft voice informs her. Without turning, she knows it is Cole. He sits on the floor beside her, cross-legged, his head bowed.

“You keep it hidden within, so the others won’t see it,” Cole continues. “But you can keep the hurt inside forever. The pain demands to be freed, felt, or it will eat you alive, tugging, tearing away from your being.”

Lavellan knows he is right, but she doesn’t know if she is up for the challenge. As long as she keeps the hurt bottled up inside her, she can pretend she is not deeply wounded. She can pretend that there is nothing wrong...

“I'm so stupid,” she breathes.

“He would strongly disagree,” Cole tells her.

She huffs, forcing a sad laugh, and wipes the tears from her cheek. 

The spirit beside her stirs, lifting a hand as if he wanted to pad her shoulder. “You wish you could heal his pain. I tried to heal it, too, but he knows how to hide himself away. It is not your fault he chose to walk this path alone.”

Lavellan turns to face Cole, trying to focus on his familiar features. The young man’s bonds with Solas were almost as strong as her own. If any of her companions knew what she was going through, it would be him. Yet, she can’t help but think about the countless conversations between Cole and Solas during their time with the Inquisition. Most of it had sounded like nonsense to her, Fade-talk neither she nor the other companions had any part in. But now that she knows the truth, all of it makes perfect sense. Cole had seen into Solas’s soul, just like he sees into hers now.

“Did you know who he truly is?”, she asks, although she already knows the answer.

The silences between them endures, turning seconds into centuries.

“Yes,” Cole admits, at last, his voice full of regret.

Her heart fills with more sorrow, all but suffocating her. Sucking in shuddering breaths, she waits for the wave of pain to fade away again. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Because he asked me not to,” is all Cole says.

More tears come and she doesn’t hold them back any longer. She has tried too hard to keep them at bay for far too long. Sobbing uncontrollably, she opens up, lets the emotions flow freely until she feels empty, exhausted. If only she could go back to the simpler days. To the life she lived before any of this happened. 

“Can you make me forget?” she asks hoarsely.

“No, you burn too bright,” he tells her, his voice low and heavy. “But the pain gives you purpose. It will help you in what must come next.”

Blinking, she regards him once more. Something in his face has changed. He looks set, stern, determined. Like he has a plan ...

“I will go back to the Fade,” he says.

“What? No!” Lavellan springs to her feet. “You can’t just leave… I… _we_ need you here.”

“I have to,” Cole replies. “What Solas is about to do will affect both worlds. I have to go back, to make sure everyone is safe.”

She takes a moment to consider what he means by that.

“The world that dreams and the world that wakes,” Cole says before she can come to a conclusion. “Both need someone to protect them.” The young man tries to smile. “You are here, keeping everyone safe. You do it better than I could. My place is with my own kind, now.”

Lavellan is surprised. This is the first time, she hears Cole talk like that, proud and willful, with so much clarity. 

A wisp of air rushes past her and Cole is gone. A heartbeat later, he reappears next to one of the lion statues, tracing the stone nose of the beast with his fingers. 

“Once, you and Solas help me to become who I was meant to be,” he says, referring back to the incident with the old templar in Redcliffe. Memories of that moment rush through Lavellan’s mind, as the young man speaks. “And he helped you to become who you were meant to be. A powerful woman. A woman of peace and plenty. It will take both of us to make him stop.”

She grits her teeth. “Easier said than done.”

“We need to heal the old pain or he will inflict more on those we love. We cannot let that happen.”

“No, we cannot,” she agrees and rubs the tears off her cheeks. “I only wish I knew how to carry on. I feel so... _tired_.” 

Cole turns to her again. “You are stronger than you think you are. That is why he loves you.”

Despite all the pain and sorrow, Lavellan huffs out a laugh. It’s a short, but genuine sound, and suddenly she feels like a weight has been lifted from her shoulders. 

“This is goodbye then?” she asks.

“I don’t want to go, but I have to,” he tells her. “I am sorry.”

Slowly, very slowly, Lavellan nods. Of course, he has to help. It is in his nature. It is why the young man grew on her in the first place.

“Dareth shiral, my friend,” she says.

“This not the end,” Cole replies.

 _Not yet,_ she thinks but doesn’t dare to say the words out loud. And she doesn’t have to. She knows that he heard her anyway by the grief-stricken look on his face.

“We will make it all go away.”

Lavellan smiles. 

“We will try, at least.”

Another moment of silence falls between them. And then, in a heartbeat, the young man named Cole is gone, vanished from this layer of existence. Lavellan feels his absence with the same intensity as her missing arm. A phantom pain that will stick with her for years, maybe even for the rest of her life. But she will carry it with her, nourish the memory of Cole, so she can never forget him. 

“You are stronger than you think you are,” she hears him say, his voice echoing in her mind. “That is why he loves you.”

Lavellan stirs, straightening up.

_That’s why he loves you, she thinks again. “Loves”. Not “loved”._

A wave of warmth washes over her, pushing the pain aside. Maybe Cole is right. Maybe there is a chance to save Solas after all.


End file.
